


Making Requiems

by williamshooketh



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Anal Sex, Episode: s03e01 Antipasto, Grief/Mourning, Introspection, M/M, Oral Sex, Past Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter - Freeform, Pining, Regret, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-12
Updated: 2018-11-12
Packaged: 2019-08-22 12:56:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16598324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/williamshooketh/pseuds/williamshooketh
Summary: He really ought to kill him now, Hannibal thinks, but there is something so boyishly enthusiastic about Anthony Dimmond that he suspects he might be more fun alive than dead.For the moment at least.





	Making Requiems

>  “Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew 
> 
> Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme. 
> 
> He must not float upon his wat'ry bier 
> 
> Unwept, and welter to the parching wind, 
> 
> Without the meed of some melodious tear.” 

John Milton, “Lycidas”

 

Confidence is a volatile element: too little of it, and Hannibal finds himself bored; too much, and one becomes a nuisance. Anthony Dimmond is one of the few Hannibal has found who can really get the balance right. He is just self-assured enough to be charming. Flirtation is clearly a game he plays often: the unwavering eye contact, the little touches, the standing-just-a-little-too-close, the tone of voice that suggests that the listener is the only person who could possibly understand what he has to say. He doesn’t spar with words in the way Will Graham can—but who can, and what use is there comparing everyone he meets to Will? 

He really should know better than to keep nicking his finger on that particular knife.

He really ought to kill him now, Hannibal thinks, but there is something so boyishly enthusiastic about Anthony Dimmond that he suspects he might be more fun alive than dead. For the moment at least. The last person Hannibal went to bed with he left broken and bleeding on the pavement outside his house in Maryland. It’s been such a while.

“Doctor Fell?” He is waiting to see if his point has been understood. Hannibal merely gives him a quirk of the corner of the mouth and waits to see what will happen next. 

Anthony steps even closer and meets his eyes directly. Cocksure. That’s the word for what he is. What other sort of person would make an accusation of murder and a sexual pass in the same breath, all in a glorified torture chamber? 

Hannibal smiles. Just a twitch of the corner of the mouth. Anthony steps forward and lays his hands on his chest. They’re toe to toe. “What’s a man have to do to get you to say those magic words?”

“What words would those be?”

He smiles. “‘Come home with me, Anthony, and I’ll let you put it in your mouth, deep as you can take it.’” 

“I hope your poetry’s better than your pick-ups, Mr. Dimmond.”

He laughs. “You don’t think there’s poetry in blunt honesty?”

In fact, Hannibal finds himself rather charmed. He can’t remember the last time he slept with someone purely for the sake of sleeping with them. Or rather he can, but he keeps his memories of Lady Murasaki folded and tucked away in one of the dustier rooms of his palace, where he cannot cut himself on their edges. With little more thought about it, he decides that he won’t kill him right away. It’s time he lived for himself a little.

“Come home with me,” he says. “And we’ll see what we can do.”

* * *

 

They take a cab to Hannibal’s apartment. The driver, no doubt used to the crowd of professionals coming from work to conduct their lunchtime affairs, keeps his eyes on the road. 

Anthony lays his hand on Hannibal’s thigh, his gaze fixed placidly on the buildings that fly past. He has an incredible lack of self-preservation instincts; anyone would blanch at the thought of being alone with someone who had so obviously killed at least one person. But his confidence likely won’t allow for the thought that someone wished him harm. Hannibal has often found it intriguing how sexual pleasure seems to cloud other people’s cognitive functions. Anthony seems to have no thought for what could come after the act itself. Part of him is somewhat disappointed—were he with Will, they would still be trading words back at the museum. Words were not inherently erotic but they became so in Will Graham’s mouth, the same way blood became erotic only when it covered his hands. 

Anthony’s hand makes a slow progression up his thigh to the top of his leg. Hannibal glances over to catch him eyeing him for a reaction. 

Without so much as a twitch of the lips, Hannibal moves his hand to his cock, lets him feel it out for himself. Anthony does, his gaze averted from Hannibal’s now, instead fixed into empty space. His mouth curves into a smile. 

“Lucky woman, your wife,” he murmurs.

Bedelia is no doubt still home; Hannibal wonders vaguely what she’ll do when he arrives with last night’s dinner guest in tow. Part of him entertains the scenario of ushering him boldly into the bedroom and locking the door behind them, just to see how she might respond. But such a prospect, while stirring in ways that Hannibal would never admit to out loud, would only open himself up to the sort of post-mortem that Bedelia is so skilled at. He can hear her now: _I wonder if,_ she’d say, _through all the wet and wild, our mutual friend didn’t suddenly bear someone else’s face._ Hannibal looks over at Anthony. Yes, the stubble is the same, as are those dark curls and those china blue eyes. What a shock he gave him back in Paris, swanning over with champagne and eyes soft and doe-like to murmur in his ear. Hannibal turned and for a moment believed he was looking at a ghost. 

A few years ago, Anthony might have been just his type: eloquent, cultured, not above the veiled conversational jab. His poetry might even be good. But that would be before Will Graham, and his empathy, and his cold distaste for what Hannibal does—his distaste and self-conscious longing… Whereas Anthony seems to embrace it out of a mere Dorian Gray-like desire to experience everything. It isn’t every day one gets to fellate a killer, after all

He strokes him through his trousers, eyes closed and lips parted. With one eye on the cab driver and making a mental note to tip him extra when they get out, Hannibal leans over and grabs a handful of Anthony’s hair, tugs slightly. He opens his mouth to speak, but Hannibal pulls him into a kiss before he can say anything. His voice is a genuine pleasure to listen to, but he prefers him like this. Silent, with his curls smooth between his fingers. His stubble scrapes the side of his face. Hannibal has dreamt of that sensation on the back of his neck and the insides of his thighs far more than he’d care to admit.

Will wasn’t, and then he was, and then he wasn’t again. Now he existed only in the ether, haunting him at every step. Hannibal knew he wasn’t dead, he’d been very careful not to leave him dead, but knowing it couldn’t erase the memory of the difficulty with which he had carved through muscle and organ and sinew. It was always harder than it looked. 

Anthony pulls back. “What is it?” He is still stroking him through his trousers, slow and languorous. Hannibal would, he realizes, really like to fuck Anthony. He almost regrets having to kill him. As though he can read his mind, Anthony whispers in his ear, “What will you do when you take me home?” The salty musk of his arousal fills Hannibal’s nose, along with the clean, peppery scent of his aftershave and slightly acrid skin. He moves his cheek against the side of his face to feel his stubble.

_Take you to bed and never let you leave_ are the words that arrive in Hannibal’s mind, but they’re too overwrought and meant for someone else. 

“Keep your secrets, then,” Anthony says when he doesn’t reply. He kisses him again. Something tugs at Hannibal’s neck, and he realizes belatedly that Anthony is undoing his tie. “Call it a trophy,” he says as it slips free of Hannibal’s collar. He waves it and stuffs it into his jacket pocket. Strangely touching, the idea he might like to keep something of his. Hannibal kisses him and thinks of the Egyptian pharaohs who took all their worldly possessions with them into the next life. The decadence feels true to Anthony’s personality, what little he knows of it. He doesn’t need to know any more. 

He lets him kiss him instead. Anthony sucks on his tongue but just as quickly pulls away to announce that they’d arrived.

Hannibal pays the fare and tips the driver, and he is mildly surprised and pleased to see that Anthony adds his own tip to the mix. Strange to think that were circumstances otherwise, Anthony might have survived him. 

“Won’t your wife still be home?” Anthony asks casually, still fumbling with his wallet. And perhaps he would not. He catches Hannibal’s eye and gives him a crooked smile; no doubt he enjoys other people’s scandalization, the illusion of being the bit on the side. He is—but Hannibal can’t say for sure who he is betraying by allowing Anthony to grab him by his collar and kiss him and whisper artless, filthy things in his ear…

The moment the elevator door slides closed, Anthony is on him: Hannibal’s shoulders hit the mirrored wall as Anthony kisses him, his nails scraping his scalp and sending gooseflesh over his body. His hips—and his erection—presses into Hannibal’s own. 

“I’m beginning to think you never learned the value of patience,” Hannibal says between kisses. 

“The price of being a spoilt Old Etonian, I’m afraid.” With methodical care, he undoes the first button of Hannibal’s shirt and presses his lips to the stripe of skin he exposes. “But I’m sure you’ll find I can be very patient when I wish.” The doors slide open as he starts in on the next button.

“To answer your earlier question,” Hannibal says as they leave the elevator, “I’m not at all sure where my wife is.”

“The element of surprise,” Anthony says. They reach the door to the apartment. Hannibal finds his key. “I admire that in people.”

As it happens, Bedelia is right there in the entryway, her suitcases in hand. Hannibal barely blinks, but Anthony frowns and stops short on the threshold, perhaps wondering what domestic drama he’s entered. Bedelia looks him up and down, then looks at Hannibal, who can feel her gaze sear over his mussed hair, his unbuttoned shirt and missing tie. It’s the pointedness of her stare that makes him decide.

“If you need me, darling,” he says at last, dryly, “Mr. Dimmond and I will be in the bedroom.” He doesn’t look back at either of them. Heavy footsteps behind tell him that Anthony is following once again. 

When the bedroom door closes, he pushes Anthony against it with a thud loud enough that he’s sure Bedelia hears it. 

“What was all that about?” asks Anthony. “Outside.”

“My wife occasionally makes trips to the seaside.” The lie is effortless. He nuzzles into his neck, nibbles the skin there. Anthony groans. 

“Do you suppose she’ll participate?” he asks.

“I doubt it.”

Anthony fumbles with the button of Hannibal’s trousers. “Can’t say I blame her for being territorial,” he says. “When you have this waiting for you every night…” He draws him out and grins as he makes a pull. Hannibal sinks his teeth into Anthony’s shoulder, and he hisses. “No wonder she always— _ow_ —looks so tired—” He cuts himself off with a gasp as Hannibal pushes his wrists up above his head against the door. If asked, he would take issue with the idea of any sort of paraphilia or sadism present in his sexual identity, but at the moment, there is something appealing in rendering the poet helpless. And Anthony makes no attempt to fight it. Rather, he melts into it. The submissive consciousness, indeed. Hannibal presses his tongue against the strong vein in the side of Anthony’s throat and feels for his pulse, the way it quickens as he undoes his trousers and draws him out with his free hand. His cock is heavy in his palm, fairly average in size, cut. 

He strokes it experimentally, slow, thumbing the vein, and Anthony licks his lips. The motion reminds Hannibal of his words back at the museum. He cannot help the smile that tugs the corners of his mouth. Anthony looks back at him, pupils blown.

“Deep as you can take it?” Hannibal says.

Anthony’s mouth curves into a smile. “ _Dottore_ , I did go to Eton, you know.”

Hannibal relinquishes the force holding Anthony’s wrists in place, and, recognizing his cue, the poet obediently sinks to his knees. 

He is, as Hannibal suspected from their first meeting in Paris, a tremendous tease. Kisses, the ghostings of fingertips, the occasional flicker of his tongue—but never his actual mouth _._ He settles his hands on Anthony’s shoulders: not a command, but a warning. Anthony ignores it, sits back on his heels, and looks up at him. 

“You know, the real Doctor Fell despised me.” He cups Hannibal’s balls and presses a lazy kiss to the side of his cock. “Couldn’t—” another kiss— “stand—” another— “that the little—poof who had to—fetch his coffee for him every morning—could turn a better phrase than he could.” He licks a long, delicate stripe down Hannibal’s cock and looks up at him, clearly delighted with himself, his companion, and life in general. “I can’t tell you how cathartic this is.”

With that he slips him into his mouth. With a hard exhale, Hannibal braces his hands against the door. Where before Anthony seemed unwilling to commit to anything, now he’s all business: taking him further and further in, hollowing his cheeks and sucking. He gazes up at him with soft, watering eyes, but Hannibal has closed his own. He lowers one hand from the door to tangle in Anthony’s hair, holding him firm. His curls are soft against his skin, soft enough to break his heart. 

Here, in this position, he can think of at least six ways he could kill him. But something—in addition to pleasure and his general distaste for mixing sex and death in matters that don’t concern Will Graham—stays his hand. 

His cock leaves Anthony’s mouth with an obscene noise. “Am I doing something wrong?” he asks. It takes a moment for him to understand: he’s softening. Bedelia continuously accuses him of living too much in the mind. Perhaps she’s more right than he cared to admit. And, true, he is no longer that twenty-year-old student who could knock on his roommate’s bedroom door and be sure of not getting a wink of sleep that night. The indignity stings. 

“What do I do?” asks Anthony.

He really should kill him now, if only to save his own dignity.

His hand is still threaded in his curls. His chest aches.

“Go to the bed,” he says. Anthony obeys with alacrity, but Hannibal doesn’t watch him, instead retreating to the bathroom to splash his face with water and ponder his next move. He wants to kill Anthony in the same generalized way he wants to kill anyone, but he wants to keep him alive for the time being for reasons far more complicated. He thinks of the teacups in his kitchen back in Baltimore, and how each one became fragments on his floor. Once again, as he has many times over, he longs for a reversal of time, for the cup to gather itself up with its particles in new places. 

If he looks up into the mirror, he will see a man seated on his bed. He knows, for all the teacups he might break, it will not be the right man.

Without looking in the mirror, he dries his face on a towel and strides with new purpose back into the bedroom to climb on top of Anthony and kiss him. Anthony immediately embraces him, an arm around his shoulders, a hand finding the back of his thigh. Blood rushes back to his cock. With his knee, he pushes Anthony’s legs apart. Anthony is feverishly unbuttoning his shirt, sucking on his tongue and, when that fails to produce the desired response, biting Hannibal’s lower lip until blood fills his mouth. 

He sits upright and pulls Anthony with him. Teeth scrape his throat, his chest. Anthony reaches for his cock, but Hannibal catches his wrist. “Undress and turn around,” he says, and the poet flushes and nods, breathless. Hannibal twists around to find the lubricant in the nightstand. When he returns, Anthony is shirtless and struggling with the zipper of his trousers, which has stuck. Hannibal gently pushes his hand out of the way and undoes it himself. 

“Are you going to fuck me?” Anthony asks as he climbs out of his underwear. “You can, if you like.” Off Hannibal’s look, he continues, “I didn’t attend your lecture with purely scholarly interests, I’m afraid.” 

Hannibal goes to finish the buttons on his shirt, but Anthony echoes his earlier gesture. “Let me,” he says. 

Hannibal supposes he must be handsome in his own way, but all he sees as Anthony undoes the last few buttons and then helps him out of his trousers is the way his forelock hangs over his eye in the precisely the same way, and that familiar furrow of concentration in his brow. 

Both naked now, Anthony straddles his lap, cups his jaw, and kisses him. “You must miss someone,” he says, “desperately.”

“Hands and knees,” Hannibal replies.

He obeys. He’s more abject this way, and more anonymous. Easy to fuck, easy to leave. Easy to kill. He responds to everything—Hannibal’s fingers, his mouth—with quiet sighs. 

He pushes inside him. His pace is hard and quick, and it doesn’t take long for Anthony to begin moaning into the mattress. He comes with Hannibal’s hand around his cock and his teeth set in his shoulder. 

It occurs to him that he never got to mourn Will, or what they had, or even the death of his old self. His own name lost to him. And Will is not dead, cannot be dead, but the frightened, helpless version of himself that he knew before imprisoning him certainly is. And what of Anthony, unknowingly caught in the middle? It seems to Hannibal that those ragged moans he draws out are his own requiem. 

He comes and, for a moment, is content to lie quietly against him, breathing in the scent of his hair and cologne. It’s perfectly suited for him. He is rather stunned to find himself missing the stench of the old aftershave.

He rolls off him. “There’s a bottle of Château Lafite in the kitchen. Dress, and you may bring us two glasses.”

“Your wife won’t mind?” he asks as he dresses. 

“I doubt not.” He shouldn’t be surprised if Anthony tries his luck with Bedelia as well while preparing a post-coital glass, if she’s still in the apartment.

Anthony puts on Hannibal’s shirt and leaves it unbuttoned. He saunters out and shoots Hannibal a minxish smile as he leaves the bedroom. 

Left alone, Hannibal puts on his dressing gown and then puts a recording of Fauré on. A quick perusal of Anthony’s jacket pockets yields up the tie he took as a trophy earlier in the cab. Hannibal stretches it taut in his hands and looks back at the doorway thoughtfully.

Far off in the kitchen comes the clink of glasses. 

He loops the tie around his hand, listens to the music for a moment or two longer, and goes to the kitchen to make the afternoon complete.


End file.
